Trimming Very Tall Palms
 

Has anyone had the problem of the landscaper saying the palm tree has become too tall to trim? What does one do in that case? The tree looks terrible and there are messy seeds from the pods everywhere. Any advice??

look in the yellow pages for a professional tree trimmer who will have a bucket truck to use in reaching the top of the palm tree.

or perhaps call some business such as village palms on 466 and ask if they have someone reliable to refer for your need.

It happens (especially with Queen Palms) and is just one more reason I dislike palm's.

Unfortunately you are going to have to find a trimmer willing (crazy enough) to use a VERY tall ladder or one that has some type of lift (scissor or bucket) to get up high enough to trim them. MAKE SURE they are FULLY insured.

Oh, and it just got significantly more expensive. :-(

Or you could find a Samoan tree trimmer. They can climb coconut palms bare foot and trim them.

Serious question:
Cut it down and plant a small palm that won't get outta hand?

serious answer:

Cut it down and plant something you like, that is zone applicable and will not be an ongoing maintenance nightmare.

Cut it down to the ground
 

As an added bonus, you will notice a drop in roach population also!
On the negative side, you will put tree trimmers out of business:cryin2::cryin2:

Fully Insured including liability and workers comp is so important. We the homeowner would be responsible for any injuries another words would be sued for compensation should a worker get hurt. So,what if he is a employee of someone else, we're on the hook. Its happening a lot in The Villages as people are looking for easy money via lawsuit.

Yeah sure, cut down that nasty roach & rodent infested palm tree and plant something really unique & exotic.....maybe like a maple or a juniper. THAT will sure impress the neighbors.

After all, nothing says Florida like sunny warm weather, white sandy beaches, a relaxed lifestyle, and.....common trees like they grow up north.

I agree with everything LndLocked said. Queen Palms are inexpensive to buy but expensive to maintain. They are full of rodents, roaches and the likes and put out awful nuisance pods and spears once a year. We had four in our yard. Loss one to winter weather (yeah) and the three remaining ones cost us a fortune to maintain. The smart thing to do is to spend the money to have them removed by a professional tree service contractor. Don't just get anyone to do this. Once removed, they require grinding out of the stump rather than removal of the root as it will surely interfere with your sprinkler system.. Hopefully new home owners will read these posts and not make the mistake of having Queen Palms as a part of their landscape. We spent on an average of $45.00 every six weeks ($15.00) each to have them trimmed.

Well said

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Ask the plant clinic if you should plant Queens here in TV?

I think Jack Nicholson said it best in the movie "The Departed" when he said
"It's a whole nation of rats"!

I've never seen any pests around the palms here yet.

The trick I think to avoid them is to maintain and remove the dead fronds.

Palm trees with slumping, dead fronds can attract pests. Rodents may nest and breed within thick layers of dead fronds in untrimmed palm trees.

Careful and periodic palm tree trimming will help prevent unwanted pests on your property.

Now if U do find rodents another option is to get a few big snakes they will keep them in check. :a040:

Citrus rats nest in the bud at the very top...that does not get trimmed. If there are palms, they will come.

We have 2 queens and trimmed them ourselves for the first 5 years.

Now our lawn guy does it with a ladder. He says when they get too tall for his ladder he will rent a cherry picker and do a bunch of "tall palm" houses at once.

A neighbor recently had a company with a cherry picker trim her trees.

So, there is an alternative...no doubt more costly and better done if you can combine the job with several neighbors.

Yeah, queens are a lot of work but they sure do look like Florida. Everybody was planting them when we landscaped in 2007. Now, you don't see them in new developments quite so much.

The big problem sometimes, is that people have them planted to close to house. When branches are touching home, the rodents, roaches start walking in. Be sure not to have any growth touching house, or your only asking for trouble

I wish someone would either confirm or deny this nasty roach rumor. I have several palms and have not seen a problem. I had no palms in NC and those palmetto bugs (roaches) were all over the place.